


Fault

by orphan_account



Series: Identity [1]
Category: NSYNC
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-03-10
Updated: 2010-03-10
Packaged: 2017-10-07 20:47:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 770
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/69088
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>JC and the fissures within.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Fault

**Author's Note:**

> Completed set of unrelated stories based on themes of duality and identity.

JC was constantly in two worlds. There was always a schism there, deep and soft around the edges. Music had smoothed the edges of it, but there were times when it changed into broken glass.

On one side was the good, successful man his parents had always wanted him to be. He was a millionaire now, paid extravagantly to sing and dance. His mother had always thought in her darkest moments that he would be singing in subway stations until the urge to perform disappeared. Now she had emerald necklaces and a famous son.

His father thought very much the same, but had the added nightmare of suspecting JC's perversion. Bobbie appeased that though.

JC suppressed his other side as much as possible. The man who loved the feel of an unshaven jaw scratching his back was a side he was never sure what to do with. It was doubly worse now that everyone in the group had some form of facial hair or another. Lance and Justin's peach fuzz (beard, they would both yell), Joey's beard and Chris' patch of something all conspired to give him incredible erotic dreams, and some remarkably ridiculous ones as well. He couldn't look at Joey for a week without snickering when he dreamt that Joey had embraced him from behind and started rubbing his chin furiously on JC's shoulder until the beard burst on fire. All Joey had said in the dream was "huh."

Oddly enough, he broke up with Bobbie that same week.

He knew he was gay. That was part of the problem, and part of why he had to divide himself so clinically. He had accepted it a long time ago but still pursued his dream, knowing the sacrifice he would have to make.

"That's not sacrifice, JC. It's pure cowardice. Pure, sheer, extreme cowardice." That's what Bobbie had said in the end, without any rancor whatsoever, just a tired voice tinged with pitying affection. He had felt the division then, like a serrated knife ripping into him.

Justin had been the most comfort after that. He knew JC's moods, and more often than not picked the right words to say, even if it had too much "yo's" and "crunk" in the sentences than they used to have. He laid careful hands on JC's shoulders and told him to get over it. He bought low fat ice cream for comfort and a straight porn tape as a joke. "Couldn't go into the gay section though, man. You know I'm not phobic, but just couldn't do it," he explained with an increasing shade of red creeping into his complexion. JC had laughed uproariously. Justin was always a solution to him.

Lance was also quite a comfort. "Prayer helps," he said in that low, molasses voice. "Not necessarily to God or anything, but just saying it out loud, to a presence, it helps me sometimes." They had gone to a church afterwards, where JC found comfort in the hushed atmosphere while Lance, reverence apparent in tone and motion, prayed.

Meanwhile, Joey and Chris planned and played every practical joke in the book. Never insensitively, but outright tasteless and what Josh thought to be fucking hilarious. Fart jokes, vomit jokes, gay jokes, nothing was off limits. Chris bought a long 12-inch dildo ("I'm not chickenshit like Justin!" he said) and used it as a dart to throw into the specially set up and wide open female condom that Joey had bought. Lance, who was mortified beyond belief, still managed to win the Chris-termed "dildart" challenge.

Once in a while though, when the group would get into impromptu wrestling matches, was when JC felt the split most keenly. Justin did it most often. He would tackle JC, and in the ensuing melee, would feel an accidental brush of beard against the back of his neck, the side of his face, against an outstretched arm. It was like flint sparks that rocked JC to the core.

Then Justin would get off, smile at him, and punch him playfully on the shoulder or arm. Either that or he would tackle JC again.

The knowledge that this would never be his, a smiling Justin getting physical, getting rough, getting affectionate, always cleaved him in half. And when Britney came along and Justin looked as if he had never been happier, the schism became permanent. He would always be split in two, no matter what.

There was some relief in that though, no matter how hard it was to maintain separate personas. Fame was nothing but an intensive course in that. Besides, he was always comfortable in ruts.


End file.
